Tuesday, April 20, 2010

Unlike most of America's regional culinary specialties, the origins of the Cornell chicken recipe are undisputed. According to nearly all reports, as well as the college itself, this famous grilled chicken recipe was created by Dr. Robert C. Baker, Professor of Animal Sciences at New York's Cornell University.

They say Dr. Baker was simply trying to invent an easy and delicious way to grill smaller, younger chickens, so that the local chicken farms could sell more birds, sell them sooner, and more affordably. The doc's tasty recipe ended up being such a success that sales in the area soared, and the recipe became a statewide favorite.

While that all makes sense, there was something that just seemed to be a bit odd. I mean, why would a college professor be so unusually motivated to increase chicken sales? Then I thought, what if he had no choice? Maybe I've been watching too many straight-to-cable movies, but what if the real story was much more sinister and diabolical.

What if Dr. Baker just didn't love chickens, but really, really, "loved" chickens? What if someone inside the local poultry industry found out about the professor's "love" and blackmailed him into devoting his life's work to promoting the succulent grilling of their chickens. That's completely insane, you say? Well, is it? Is it? Yes, actually that is ridiculous. Never mind.

Anyway, the results of my Cornell chicken experiment were exceptional. I love this basing sauce. The combination of the egg, oil, and vinegar created a super flavorful, and very moist chicken. I used the original recipe "as is," but as I explain in the video, Dr. Baker's method was intended to be done over a barbecue pit. If you want to see his original plans, you can see them here on the Cornell University website.

I have a bunch of the sauce leftover, so I'm excited to play around with some different variations, so stay tuned for that. I hope you give this a try, since grilling season will soon be in full swing, and you can never have too many ways to do chicken. Enjoy!

45 comments:

David
said...

Great video(the HD is terrific)! But I think it should be noted that in the video you say to use another brush if you want to baste the chicken after its been pulled from the grill, but the sauce (marinade) still has had raw chicken in it and could cause cross contamination. A better tip would be to reserve a second portion of the marinade so that you don't have to worry about chicken bacteria at all.

I made this last night John and it was delicious! The original recipe and I also wimped out on the 24 hour marinade but next time I'm going longer. This is good stuff. Thanks Chef John for a great post.Eric

I tried this a variant on this recipe with Cornish Game Hen instead of chicken and it turned out fabulous.

Since we don't have a charcoal grill and I didn't want to use the gas grill outside, my variation (other than the substitution of bird) was to sear in a grill pan and then finish in a 350 degree oven. Worked out super, so to Rosemary up there a comment or so ago, I say go for it.

I marinated for about four hours with no ill effect. The extra time in the vinegar gave it a bit of a twang.

I can only imagine how well it'd work on a classic pit-style barbecue.

I marinated a couple of large chicken breasts for 24 hours. I was worried that all that salt and vinegar would "pickle" the meat, but it was perfect. We were practically swooning. My wife wanted to eat the bones.

This oddly reminded me of the fantastic Thai BBQ chicken that we used to get from a neighborhood joint. Next time I'm going to add sugar, red chile paste and fish sauce to see if I can re-create it.

In my version, I used rice wine and it worked well. I don't see why any decent vinegar, other than some of the stranger ones made especially for salads, like raspberry, wouldn't work.

Balsamic might be overkill -- I'd expect that it would take over completely -- but it might be worth a try.

Bear in mind that most balsamic vinegars really aren't. Look at the ingredients and you'll note that they're some other vinegar (such as cider) with caramel coloring. I even bought a rather expensive bottle in a fancy-schmancy gourmet shop in Palm Desert that turned out to be bogus, so check the label before plunking down the better part of a Franklin.

Olive oil should be okay, though I wouldn't go with the extra virgin -- high heat does strange things to EVOO -- just use plain old workaday olive oil. I think Rachel Ray is nuts for using it in everything, Mark Miller of Coyote Cafe strongly disrecommends it for high heat and I tend to agree with him. If Chef has an opinion, I'd like to hear it.

Next time I do this, I'm thinking of maybe adding some garlic to the marinade, as well, just because. . . well, as Alton Brown put it, garlic don't need no reason.

Last evening I made a batch of the marinade. I used 1/2 the amounts in the recipe (except for the egg) and it made enough for one chicken with enough to baste during the grilling. This has to be the simplest and greatest marinade I have EVER made!

Thanks a lot to the Professor and many more thanks to you C.J. for everything this site offers.

My 2 year old Sophia and my 5 year old Luke (grandchildrend) loved this chicken (picky eaters, ate it to the bone). My husband comments on my new recipes as to whether I can make them before or after he dies. He says make this again, good sign, means before he dies. A winner! Followed the recipe as directed - loved it as did all my family

I have a 1985 Reprint of the original Cornell Information Bulletin 862 by Robert Baker (Published originally in 1952). It's out of print now but I would be glad to send a PDF file copy of the brochure to anyone who wants it.

Penn State has a very similar recipe but without the eggs. Dr. Baker did one of his graduate degrees there so he may have tweaked the PSU recipe when he moved on to Cornell.

Also, Dr. Roy Curtiss at Arizona State, lays claim to a NY State Fair winning chicken BBQ sauce. He was a student at Cornell (I think in Poultry Science) in the early 50's so there are actually several BBQ recipes created or adapted by various PhD's at several esteemed universities.

We do 50 to 75 halves at a time several times each summer using Dr. Baker's technique.

The original recipe does not call for marinating the chicken in the sauce at all. It would be difficult to marinate 100 or 200 or 300 halves of chicken the way the fire departments do chicken BBQ's in CNY. The bulletin recommends just grilling it very slowly on a rack about 20 - 24inches over the charcoal and basting it (with a cloth BBQ mop) every time the chicken is turned (about every 5 - 10 minutes). Marinating it briefly sounds like a good technique for the home BBQ though!

The bulletin also says that the ideal broiler half should weigh 1 pound and to cook it for about 1 hour. I'm gonna tell you that you will be lucky if you find broiler halves that weigh less than 1 1/2 pounds. They usually run closer to 2 pounds so it is often necessary to go 1 1/2 to 2 hours on a pit to get the halves to that melt in your mouth goodness. Controlling the charcoal is key.....you don't want it to get too hot so it is important to have a hose or spray bottle of water on hand to cool things down if it gets too hot.

When I do a few halves on my Weber kettle grill, I do it over indirect heat for the first hour and then dump the coals in the middle (perhaps add a few more) and finish it over direct heat to get a nice char...(not quite as charred as your video) but almost. It should literally melt in your mouth when it is done.......it will be very moist and VERY tender.

The bulletin includes recipe quantities for 5, 10, 25, 50, 100, 200 and 300 halves plus detailed guidelines on setting up the BBQ pit and techniques for mopping and turning the chicken.

As a native Rochesterian who grew up in Baltimore, MD, I was always told this was "Delmarva Barbecue Chicken" for the Delmarva peninsula of Maryland (where Purdue and Tyson grow chickens for the entire east coast), so it took me a while to find this recipe on your site, but it's good to know the "original" name for this, though Delmarva is prominent in at least one version of the history. A local Baltimore magazine printed an in depth article about this, in fact:http://www.urbanitebaltimore.com/baltimore/wings-of-desire/Content?oid=1245003

Finally - when I've made this, I let the chicken marinate overnight, and it was still phenomenal.

As a native Rochesterian who grew up in Baltimore, MD, I was always told this was "Delmarva Barbecue Chicken" for the Delmarva peninsula of Maryland (where Purdue and Tyson grow chickens for the entire east coast), so it took me a while to find this recipe on your site, but it's good to know the "original" name for this, though Delmarva is prominent in at least one version of the history. A local Baltimore magazine printed an in depth article about this, in fact:http://www.urbanitebaltimore.com/baltimore/wings-of-desire/Content?oid=1245003

Finally - when I've made this, I let the chicken marinate overnight, and it was still phenomenal.

I thoroughly enjoy your overall product. Congratulations---I think you are already a success. Mix one part personality, another part cooking skills, and sprinkle on the fact that you truly love what you do, you end up with a matter of time before all your cooking aspirations come true!

Can't wait to try this recipe! my son is at Cornell and loves the "vinegar chicken" there. Hopefully mine will taste as good.Sending this recipe along to him as well since he lives off campus and may try to make it himself!

I grew up with chicken recipe, living in the fingerlakes of NY.We always marinated overnite.You should try using 1/2 vingar and 1/2 lemon juice, lil minced garlic, and some fresh chopped rosemary for a little different kick. Delious !!!!! what we do also - don't brush marinate on we dip pcs into bowl of marinate and put back on the grill. Full of flavor.

2014: Update People...1955, I was 7yo, Went to the EN0Joy Park and Had the BEST Chicken BBQ in the world...Cornell???Now it's Rob Salamida Co Chicken BBQ Sauce Made in the Small Town Of Johnson city NY.